Emily watched the portly figure of her housemate swing down the quiet street, a dominant person with the stiff little feathers on her smart new toque standing erect and defiant against the summer breeze. Emily’s expression was meek, almost sad, rather detached, without bitterness. There was a pink pucker about her pleasant lips as of one who has tolerated oppression long but without the usual resultant bitterness. A little tremulous smile was always hovering nearby, ready to slip out when no one was about.
When Harriet had passed out of sight, Emily turned with a quick, birdlike motion and hurried down the back stairs to the kitchen, a light of interest in her gentle blue eyes like one who climbs for a stolen pot of jam.
“You almost done, Becky?” she asked of the sad-faced, dreary-eyed woman who was ironing a blue-checked apron by the window.
“Yep. Just about. Only got two, three more pieces.” And she stooped to the basket underneath her board and shook out a towel, a napkin, and some handkerchiefs. “Yep, an’ I s’pose it’ll be about the last time, too, Emily,” she went on, sighing heavily as she straightened up and went back to her ironing. “It certainly does go hard to leave you, but a body can’t live on just one wash a week, and my heart’s gettin’ worse every day now. Sometimes it thumps all day long. I s’pose Tom’s right, an’ I gotta give up work an’ live with him, but it goes against the grain somethin’ terrible. You know I never did like that flibbertygib of a girl he married. I druther be independent. But then, that’s life!”
The other woman looked distressed. Soft pink puckers came round her sweet lips. “I’d like so much to just keep you here all the time, Becky,” she said sadly. “You know how I feel about it—but—you know Harriet!“
“Oh, land, yes! That could never be. Harriet an’ I could never get along—that goes ‘thout sayin’. But don’t you worry, I know what Harriet is! You’ve been just wonderful to me, stickin’ to me all these years, an’ givin’ me the wash in spite of her, an’ gettin’ me the schoolhouse to scrub an’ all. It ain’t your fault they thought I was slow. I was. I was mortal slow, but I couldn’t he’p it. Some mornin’s seems zif I jest couldn’t drag myself along to finish, and that janitor got impatient and wanted to lock up and go home to his lunch. I couldn’t blame him. I woulda done the same in his place. But there! It’s over, and what’s the use talkin’?
“Harriet’s gone, I s’pose, gone to her precious porch meetin’. Well, I’m glad she’s out of the house. You an’ I can have a bit of a word for good-bye without her stickin’ her nose in, can’t we? Seems zo I couldn’t uv gone away ‘thout that. I know it ain’t any sweet proposition fer you, eiter, you poor child. Strange your pa ever took such a notion to her, leavin’ the property that way, half to her. I never could make it out.”
Emily flushed in a troubled way.
“Father felt under obligation,” she said hesitatingly. “Her husband was an old boyhood friend, something like you and me, you know, Becky.”
The older woman flashed a look of adoration at Emily, whose warm blue eyes beamed back a deep, quiet love and trust.
“Then there was some money Father borrowed when he was in financial difficulty once, and lost it, and I believe he felt under obligation to look after the widow when he got in better circumstances.”
“Hmm! Seems zif he mighta found some way to do that that wouldn’t a been so hard on you!” she commented dryly.
A puzzled pucker came between Emily’s eyes: “Father said he was thinking of me when he did it,” she said slowly. “He put it in his will that he didn’t want me to be alone in the house. I think he meant it for the best. You know he was alienated from the rest of the family. They didn’t have much to do with him—”
“I know! They mighta had some reason, but excuse ’em all you can; they’re as mean ez pusley, an’ you never lost much by their bein’ alienated. Your father mighta been odd. He was odd as Dick’s hatband, none odder, but he wasn’t a hypocrite like most o’ them, an’ I guess he meant well.”
She shook out a towel and thumped the iron heavily over the hem.
Emily looked off with a troubled gaze.
“You see,” she said, as if trying to reconcile the matter to her own satisfaction, “he’s always taken care of me in every way, and he didn’t realize I could look out for myself. He wanted to make sure that I would not be alone, and he figured that if she had a half right in the house, she wouldn’t go away and leave me. I think he meant well.”
“Oh yes,” said the other woman, “I s’pose he did, an’ he was right so far as she was concerned. She won’t never go away! She’ll always freeze on to whatever’s hers and stay froze. But her son, he can’t get along with her neither.”
More distress in the sweet eyes. “No,” admitted Emily. “He couldn’t stand being ordered round so much. And he’s a good boy. He wanted to get married, but his mother wouldn’t have it, said she’d never let him bring the girl he’d picked out to her house. Jud is a good boy, and that little Ariel Custer is a good girl. I’d like to see them get married; they’d be so happy!” She sighed and looked off dreamily through the kitchen window with wistfulness in her eyes.
“Say, you look just like you did when you was a little girl!” exclaimed the older woman. “My! but you was a pretty little girl with them blue eyes—they ain’t changed a mite—and them yellow curls like gold! ‘Member how we useta go wading in the brook? Sometimes I think I’d like to go back and be a child again. We didn’t have a care ner a pain, just blue sky and sunshine. If your mother could see you now all alone, wouldn’t she take on? She never useta let you go alone anywheres, and that was my job, always to go with you. She’d pack up bread and butter, and gooseberry jam and cookies, and we’d go down to the brook and wade, and play house by the hemlock trees, with moss fer a carpet and acorns fer cups and saucers. ‘Member? I was thinkin’ of it the other day. My! but the lappin’ round yer ankles. ‘Member that day when the big boys come along, and you slipped on the stone and fell in, and Nate Barrett pulled you out? I remember how your ma looked when we took you home and how sweet she smiled at Nate and told him she never would forget it. That was just the year before she died, wasn’t it? Your pa never did like Nate, though. I remember the time Nate brought you an orange, and your pa wouldn’t let you have it and sent him home. It seemed real unjust after his savin’ your life that way. He was a nice boy, and real fond of you.”
Emily’s cheeks had bloomed out rosily, but she controlled her voice steadily. “I think Father had some sort of misunderstanding with Nate’s father,” she apologized bravely, “about some wood. I think it was. Father was rather quick, you know.”
Emily Dillon bent her head over the apron she was mending, and Rebecca Ford cast a keen glance at the brown hair that was beginning to soften with touches of silver about the edges.
“Ever hear from Nate after he went away?”
Rebecca cast the question out with a dry casualness that saved it from being embarrassing.
The pink stole higher in the softly faded cheeks, and the sweet eyes clouded for an instant as their owner turned to gaze wistfully out of the window.
“No, I never heard,” she answered slowly. “He went out west. That is all I know.”
“Yes, he did,” said Rebecca, moving Mrs. Granniss’s robe over to make room for the towel she had just ironed, “and the other day down to the ‘Merican store I heard Ike Bowman telling Dick Smith how he and his wife met up with him last winter on a trip they was taking out to Californy. You know Ike and Dick come from over Mercer way and musta known Nate. Ike said Nate was livin’ on a ranch of his own, I forget whether ‘twas sheep or cattle or oranges, but they said he was doin’ well; had money in the bank and was well thought of, an’ he kep’ house fer himself, but he hed everything nice, an’ ‘lectric lights an’ water and everything in the house. He said it was outside of someplace they called Boy City or something like that. I remembered it ’cause it seemed so natural fer him to be anywhere round where there was boy
s. He never was much fer the girls, only—you know—”
Emily Dillon arose suddenly and opened the door of the hall cautiously, putting her face into the opening. The breeze from the dining-room window blew on her hot cheeks and gave her steadiness as she stood apparently listening. When she turned around, her face was entirely serene.
“I didn’t know but Harriet had forgotten something and come back,” she explained, “but I guess it was just a dog scratching at the screen door.”
Rebecca eyed her intently with satisfaction.
“My, how pretty you do look! Your cheeks is as pink as clove pinks! Your figure’s as trim as when you was fourteen. Your skirt’s an awful good fit. I always did admire that skirt. I thought if I ever got ahead I’d get me one like it someday if you didn’t mind. When you get it wore out, Em’ly, give it to me fer a keepsake. I’d like to have it hangin’ round in the closet jest to remind me o’ you.”
“Why, you can have it now, Becky!” laughed Emily, laying down her sewing and beginning to fumble with the belt fastening. “I’m tired of it anyway, and I don’t need it. I’ve got two new ones. I’d love to have you wear it. There’s quite a lot of wear in it yet, and I believe it would fit you. We’re about of a size.”
Emily unhooked her skirt and stepped out of it smiling. Rebecca Ford, iron poised in air, stood protesting delightedly.
“Oh, now, Em’ly, I couldn’t take it right off your back that way. I really couldn’t. And you lookin’ so nice in it an’ all. Besides, what’ll Harriet say?”
“It’s not Harriet’s skirt,” said Emily with dignity. “She has no call to say anything.”
“Oh, well, that won’t stop her,” declared Rebecca wisely. “She’s the most uncalled person I know, Harriet is.”
Emily’s eyes twinkled.
“Well, she’ll never know,” she soothed coaxingly, “for the other one’s made almost exactly the same, pocket and all. That pocket’s nice and handy, too. I always like a pocket. Take it, Becky. I’d like to have you have it.”
The other woman laid down her iron and took the coveted garment eagerly, running an admiring finger down inside the pocket.
“Land sake, Em’ly, you’ve left some money in here,” she said, preparing to extract it.
“That’s all right, Becky; keep it for good luck!”
She looked almost a girl, so slim and little in her little black sateen petticoat and her neat buttoned shoes; prim and sweet and lovable. One could hardly think of her as an old maid, nor yet as even an elderly person. There were lines of youth about her, youth held in abeyance like a bud that has waited a long time to bloom.
A knock at the front door sent her scuttling up the back stairs to get another skirt, and Rebecca Ford grim and inquisitive to the hall to answer the knock. It was only a delivery wagon come to the wrong house, and Rebecca quickly sent it on its way. Back in the kitchen again, she tried on the skirt and went to the dining-room sideboard to get a glimpse of herself.
“Fits like the paper on the wall,” she said, with a note of grim hilarity in her voice as Emily came down the back stairs again neat and trim once more in another black serge skirt. “But I could never look like you; I stoop too much. You’re straight as a pipe stem and walk like a robin. Anybody’d know me from my walk. Well, I guess I’ll be wrapping it up before old Hawkeye gets back. It’s near time for her to appear. What’s the matter with the car? Why don’t she ride it in this hot weather?”
“Well, you know she never learned to drive it herself, and I—well, I didn’t feel like learning. I’m sure I should run into somebody. Besides, I thought it was better not to mix things. Of course I went out in it now and then when Jud was here, but Harriet hasn’t been out in it much since Jud left home.”
“Where’s that short-haired, outlandish Boggs girl? I thought she could always be depended on to be on tap any time when wanted.”
Emily’s eyes twinkled again, but she answered demurely, “I believe she’s gone to the shore with her aunt for a short time.”
“Hmm! Well, I thought she’d vanish when Jud went away. With all her softness, I thought Harriet would find out she wasn’t so fond of just her as she thought. Well, Em’ly, I guess I must be gettin’ along. I don’t guess we’ll see each other much more this side the grave. I’m not one to talk a lot, but you certainly have been a bright spot in my life. If I could just leave it here and walk out into the other, I’d be satisfied; but I do hate like pizen this next part, goin’ to live with my daughter-in-law and bein’ took care of. It may not last long, to be sure, and then again it may; but all I’ve got to say is, Emily Dillon, when you get up there in your Methodist heaven, just you wait around near the door for me, for you’ll see me comin’ waitin’ to take care o’ you. We been separated a lot these last years, but I got faith to b’lieve that the Lord that made you can save me, too, and won’t let us be so fur apart up there. Now, don’t you look like that. If Harriet ever gets married, I’ll come an’ take care o’ you again. I b’lieve ‘twould cure my heart-trouble just to be gettin’ your meals.”
“But, Becky!” cried Emily Dillon in distress. “It’s dreadful for you to be going away where you don’t want to go. Just you be patient. I’ve always thought things would come around our way, and you keep up heart a little while longer.”
Her eyes were starry with hope, and the other woman laughed wistfully: “All right, Em’ly, you keep on havin’ faith, and I’ll try to remember what you say and keep on havin’ it, too. There she comes! Well, I’ll say good-bye. If you ever come Mercer-way, you’ll stop and see me, won’t you? I expect Tom to come after me day after tomorrow.”
The two women clasped each other’s hands tensely for a moment with tears in their eyes, while heavy steps were coming steadily up the walk to the front porch. Then Emily pushed a little soft gray roll into the other woman’s hand, whispering, “It’s just a gray veil for you, Becky. I bought it the other day. Oh, Becky, I shall miss you! You’ve been almost like a mother to me many a time, and I shall miss you!”
She put her hands on Rebecca Ford’s shoulders and drew her face close to hers, pressing the other woman’s lips with her own in a quick, fervent kiss, and then, as the screen door of the hall opened, she slipped noiselessly up the back stairs to her room.
Chapter 13
The relentless footsteps came straight on to the kitchen, stalked about a bit; the sound of the back door key turning in its lock, and then Harriet Granniss came upstairs and knocked at Emily’s door.
“I thought I heard someone in the kitchen as I came in,” she said accusingly. “That lazy woman hasn’t been here all this time, has she? She had only a half dozen pieces to iron when I left. I went and counted them. What did you pay her? Any more than the usual amount?”
“Oh no,” said Emily, breathing freely. “Just the usual amount.”
Harriet eyed her intently.
“Well, if she’s been here all this time, she must have been ironing some of her own clothes and using our gas and our time. They do that, you know. You’ve got to watch everything! I heard of a good woman we could get today if you weren’t so sentimental about this lazy good-for-nothing. I’m sure I heard someone in the kitchen when I came in, and she hasn’t ironed my robe. She didn’t put away the ironing board, either.”
Emily gave her a vague, faraway smile. She had found this the most effective mode of stopping the flow of such language that was gall and wormwood to her sweet and loving soul. It also helped her to hold in her wrath, if she could force a smile. So she smiled. There really was nothing Harriet Granniss could say to that smile, so she strode heavily into her own room and began to remove her best new voile preparatory to getting supper. It was her business to get supper that night, and she always did her duty thoroughly and well, even though she often had items on her menu that she knew Emily Dillon did not eat. But then she ought to have liked them, and Harriet felt she was serving a good purpose when she thus forced them on her. If in return Emily had chosen to
serve on her nights any article of diet that Harriet had listed as taboo, Emily would never have heard the last of it.
But tonight Emily Dillon was not thinking of menus, and she accepted a little of everything that was on the table and smiled as she listened to the town gossip from the Congregational porch meeting. Betty Champion was going to marry Norman Hunger and take care of his seven children. An awful fool Harriet thought she was, as if women weren’t better off unmarried! They said coal was going to be very scarce and high the next year or two, and the Undikes were going to burn wood and nothing else. They had a fireplace in every room in the house and a lot of trees around their place. That oldest child of the postmaster’s was going blind, they said; and little Nellie Smiley had run away to New York to work. There was going to be a big parade on Labor Day and she had promised to bake some devil’s food for the dinner in the Borough Hall, and a rice pudding for the Poor Picnic.
Emily smiled and said “Yes” and “No” in the proper places and ate a mincing supper, but there was a light in her eyes that made the hawk-eyed one watch her closely.
“You don’t act as if you heard a word I said, Emily Dillon,” said Harriet unpleasantly, rising and beginning to clear away the dishes. “I declare, I’d think you’d want to know a little of what was going on in the world.”
“Why, yes,” said Emily pleasantly, “it’s interesting, of course.”
Harriet sighed ponderously. She was just aching for a fight, and Emily never would fight. Harriet was bored.
“Well, I’m going to prayer meeting tonight!” she declared. “What about you?”
“I think I’ll just stay on the porch,” said Emily. “I’ve sort of felt the heat today.”
“Well, I do my duty in spite of the heat,” snapped Harriet, filling her mouth copiously from the last piece of cake on the plate, thus saving herself a trip to the cake box.